Christian Questions Bible Podcast

Two of the most dramatic lives recorded in the Bible belong to Moses and Jesus. The heroics of Moses' life extended over a lifetime of 120 years, whereas Jesus’ heroics were all accomplished within a 33-year lifetime. Despite the dramatic time differences, there are startling similarities between these two deliverers. Moses’ life was recorded and detailed in four Old Testament books of the Bible. Jesus' life was recorded and detailed in four New Testament books. Both of them were plainly or prophetically referenced throughout the entire Bible. They each executed the two greatest deliverances in the history of mankind – Moses walked his people out of Egypt, and Jesus ransomed the entire human race from sin. This all just scratches the surface! As we look into specific events of Moses' life as deliverer of a nation, we will see inspiring revelations into the life of Jesus as deliverer of the world. Comparing Moses to Jesus makes for a revealing Bible study, as there is a huge list of striking similarities between the two

Special Guest: David Stein
“Words mean things” is a simple and powerful truism that certainly applies to our study of God’s word. In our mistranslation podcast series, we have endeavored to establish how much a text of Scripture can be changed by the mistranslation or misunderstanding of a single word. Every word of inspired Scripture can and should be scrutinized for its meaning. Mistranslationsoccur sometimes by accident, sometimes because of preconceived belief and sometimes to deliberately deceive. Confusion is the foundation of deception. Satan likes nothing better than planting seeds of error and seeing them called truth. But by God’s grace, we are blessed with all the needed tools to examine and clarify nearly all questions of mistranslation and misunderstanding. Of course, the holy spirit works with us in our continual search for the truth.

Special Guest: David Stein
For any Christian, understanding the Bible and its message should be of paramount importance. The fact that the Bible is a collection of books and letters written in ancient times by various authors presents a challenge to this understanding. We need to learn what is authentic, what is mistranslated and how it all harmonizes. We continue our exploration of how we got our Bible, and how the process of translation from the original languages requires precision in order to get the truths God intends.  This is a necessary exercise because the Bible is the foundation of our faith. We depend upon an accurate and honest assessment of what it teaches so we in turn can believe and spread the true Gospel message!

To honor your father and mother is the 5th of the 10 Commandments given to Moses for Israel. Like all of the other Commandments, this is a very old-fashioned and worn-out sounding principle. I mean, we all know that we should respect our parents to some degree, but are we supposed to let them run our lives? What exactly is entailed in honoring parents? And what if your parents were not good parents? Maybe they were absent, or worse. Does our present age of overwhelming personal freedom and choice override this ancient law? Can honoring your parents in some circumstances be detrimental to them and you? Fortunately, the Bible does put all of this in order. It provides us with sound reasoning and direction so we can enthusiastically fulfill this Commandment!

To honor your father and mother is the 5th of the 10 Commandments given to Moses for Israel. Like all of the other Commandments, this is a very old-fashioned and worn-out sounding principle. I mean, we all know that we should respect our parents to some degree, but are we supposed to let them run our lives? What exactly is entailed in honoring parents? And what if your parents were not good parents? Maybe they were absent, or worse. Does our present age of overwhelming personal freedom and choice override this ancient law? Can honoring your parents in some circumstances be detrimental to them and you? Fortunately, the Bible does put all of this in order. It provides us with sound reasoning and direction so we can enthusiastically fulfill this Commandment!

Last week we talked about perseverance as an essential aspect of our Christian lives. We saw that persevering means much more than simply hanging on when things are tough. It means we sets our hearts and minds on moving forward, no matter how small the steps might be. We examined some Isaiah scriptures that gave us a glimpse of what Jesus’ own focus - what his “game face" - looked like. And we established that we need perseverance in many areas of life and discussed it in the context of our trials and afflictions. We heard the story of Jonathan, a 14-year-old young man who is persevering through a serious case of Scoliosis. Today, we expand the scope of our perseverance conversation as we look at the persecutions and tests of loyalty every Christian must endure. We do this both scripturally and through the stories of Lorain and Fred, two mature Christians whose life experiences pressed them to persevere in ways they never saw coming.

Perseverance is not something we talk about much anymore. It sounds like an old word from some other time in history. Now we talk about making demands, about our personal perspectives being instantly and unquestioningly accepted by those around us. We now live in a society where it is not about hard work or building something from the ground up; it is about claiming whatever anyone else has as mine simply because I have a voice. It's too bad. In history, the greatest positive changes in all the world happened largely because of perseverance. Gandhi persevered, Martin Luther King, Jr. persevered, allied soldiers in the World Wars persevered. Jesus not only personally persevered, he taught us how to do it ourselves.

Compromise can be so misunderstood. On one hand, we as Christians should be standing for and living a compromise-free life. Nothing should ever water down our life principles of sacrifice. Walking steadfastly in Jesus’ footsteps must always be our immovable goal. On the other hand, there are times and places when compromise is not only an option, but a necessary and spiritually-based choice of righteousness. Because we are all imperfect we will inevitably come across circumstances where it is not a lowering of our standards, but a raising of them. How then do we tell the difference? What makes some compromises good and others just plain wrong?

Christmas has changed.  While the holiday has always had many non-Christian aspects it seems as though the Christ based pieces of the tradition are ever fading.  In its place we have Santa, reindeer, trees, gifts, lights, ornaments, food, family and for this year, social distancing.  Now most of those things are not bad, with the notable exception of the social distancing.  In fact, they do tend to bring a cheerful sense to our lives.  Putting Christ in Christmas is about much more than good cheer – it is about a message of glad tidings of great joy, and it’s for all people!  How do we get back to focusing on bringing joy to the world instead of just a moment of emotional excitement?

In part 1 of this two-part series, we discovered several very clear scriptural statements and lines of reasoning that showed us we are justified by faith. Having established that, the most obvious next question is, what about works? How does the Bible define “works of faith”? Is it a work of faith to go to church, or is that just a result of faith? Is financially contributing to your church considered a work of faith, or is it just a good thing to do? Are there certain things every Christian is required to do, or is it all based on who you are? To what degree is our pathway to heaven based on works? How do we know if we are doing enough?